Jeremy Clarkson has attacked Nicola Sturgeon in a column venting his frustrations at coronavirus restrictions during filming for the latest series of The Grand Tour. 

The presenter accused Scotland’s first minister of appearing to be “driven solely by a deep-seated hatred of the English” in a piece for The Sunday Times. 

Clarkson bemoaned the fact that “Covid control freaks are running our show” as he recalled heading to Scotland over the summer to film scenes for the Amazon Prime motoring series, which he co-hosts with Richard Hammond and James May.

“My God, the rules of engagement [Amazon] supplied were dizzying,” he wrote. We were to take our own testing lab on the 1,000-mile journey and the key players were to be tested every day, after filling out an online form that began by asking if we’d been tested before. ‘Yes. Yesterday.’”

Detailing a number of measures including social distancing, sanitising things people had touched, having to hire out a whole hotel rather than rooms as well as flying on their own plane, Jeremy said: “The cost of meeting all these requirements was enormous… I didn’t think there was a hope in hell we’d get started, let alone finished.

“And that’s before we get to the problem with Scotland,” he continued.

“Nicola Sturgeon seems to be driven solely by a deep-seated hatred of the English, so we were expecting her to close the border at any moment. Which would have meant throwing away all the money that had been spent.”

The Covid-19 crisis had originally delayed production on the fourth series of The Grand Tour, which Clarkson hosts with former Top Gear co-stars Hammond and May.